CFILC Staff Present: Teresa Favuzzi, Christina Mills, Henry Contreras, Samantha Garcia

CFILC Statewide Meeting

February 10th, 2014

Members Present: Bob Hand, Sheri Burns, Susan Rotchy, Ana Acton, Louis Frick, Larry Grable, Eli Gelardin, Fran Bates, Nayana Shah, David DeNola, Dolores Nason, Elsa Quezada, Jessie Lorenz, Paul Van Doren, Carol Bradley-Coonce, Jo Black, Wanda Remmers

CFILC Staff Present: Teresa Favuzzi, Christina Mills, Henry Contreras, Samantha Garcia

Guests Present: Jay Harris (DOR), Brenda Premo, Liz Pazdral (SILC)

Welcome and Introductions

Review and Approval of October Minutes

Motion: Elsa moves to approve October Statewide Meeting minutes

2nd: Carol Seconds

Discussion: none

Ayes: Bob Hand, Sheri Burns, Susan Rotchy, Ana Acton, Louis Frick, Eli Gelardin, Fran Bates, Nayana Shah, David DeNola, Elsa Quezada, Jessie Lorenz, Paul Van Doren, Carol Bradley-Coonce

Nays: none

Abstentions: Larry Grable, Dolores Nason

All Approve

CFILC Business Meeting – Teresa Favuzzi

State of CFILC

·  The membership honors and recognizes the passing of Dr. Lee Nattress.

Transitions

·  Membership recognizes and congratulates Nayana Shah as the newest Executive Director.

·  Fran and Jo will be retiring and Garden Grove, Berkeley and Claremont are in transition.

·  As there are so many changes in ILC leadership, we may want to really talk about how we are going to, as a statewide association, support incoming executives. We have had a mentoring process where executives will help mentor an incoming executive but there is so much change, we may want to take a more strategic approach. We want everyone to be successful.

CFILC membership

·  Last year, 22 of 28 centers were members; this year, 21 of 28 centers are members. Non-members are Eureka, Modesto, Sacramento, and four of the six centers in LA – CALIF, SCRS-IL, ILCSC, WCIL.

ILC Service Area Maps

·  Maps are here. State senate, state assembly and congressional district maps will also be available – poster-sized or 8.5 x 11. CFILC is working to have a Braille version of the map.

Website and Social Media

·  CFILC launched a Facebook page.

·  CFILC is continuing to build the contractor pool and resources section of the member website area. Please let Teresa know if you know of any good contractors – they must provide a minimum 10% discount.

·  Between now and the next Statewide meeting, what kind of resources would you like to be added to the back of the website? Business plan templates, ADRC docs that have been developed, Strategic Plan examples, health benefits and who you cover, dos and don’ts for Executive Directors (policies and procedures, top priorities, information about program income – what it is and how it needs to be used and when).

·  ACTION ITEM: Sheri will send examples (such as personnel and administrative policies) that they have available, including DOR information they have received, which CFILC will put on the website. Ana will send auditor information they have available. Dolores will send internship information. Jessie will send CalChambers and ILRCSF guidances on intern and volunteer guidelines. Elsa will send DOR documents on revisions, amendments and other items.

Development

·  Budget – 1.8 million dollar budget.

·  CFILC received a $5,000 donation from Anthem Blue Cross in support of Keep the Wheels Rolling Fund (allows centers to request funds to refurbish scooters and wheelchairs), which has also received $3,000 from The Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation. The program currently has a total of $12-15,000. We may be able to increase the amount applicants can apply for as we are discovering that some higher-end batteries cost more than the previous amount that could be applied for.

·  CFILC received $25,000 for YO! from the S.L. Gimbel Foundation, $10,000 from an anonymous foundation and $12,000 from Friends of Californians with Disabilities.

·  CFILC has a small contract with the Center for Accessible Technology to do some utility advocacy.

·  CFILC is finishing up on the Urban Institute contract; we have been asked to stay on 2 additional months to help other contractors.

·  CFILC has a small contract with CIL to assist with youth leadership.

·  CFILC has a small contract with WID to assist with youth employment work.

Election – Board Secretary

·  With Dolores Kollmer’s departure, we have an open position.

Motion: Eli nominates Elsa for Board Secretary.

Second: Jessie seconds.

Discussion: none

Ayes: Bob Hand, Sheri Burns, Susan Rotchy, Ana Acton, Louis Frick, Eli Gelardin, Fran Bates, Nayana Shah, David DeNola, Elsa Quezada, Jessie Lorenz, Paul Van Doren, Carol Bradley-Coonce, Larry Grable, Dolores Nason

Nays: none

Abstentions: none

Motion carries

Lawsuit – Sacramento International Airport

·  CFILC and Disability Rights Advocates participated in a day-long mediation process. The mediator decided we could not be in the same room with the county airport and their consultant, who was very difficult to work with, and worked from two different rooms. There were points of agreement and points of contention. A joint visit with experts from both sides will happen in the next month or two to work out remaining issues. DRA has already solved a number of access issues with the vendors. The biggest issue has been what each side considers a counter. This should be an easy fix, though they are resistant.

Staff

·  CFILC now has 16 staff, 75% of whom identify as being a person with a disability.

·  CFILC recently hired a new staff person to help with websites, social media and collateral material development.

·  CFILC brought Kim Hogan on permanently (she was working on the UI contract and will now work on the CETF program).

Programs

·  AFP: National Cooperative Bank offered a business-to-business loan structure, utilizing a line of credit; this is not the best structure for us but we are continuing the conversation with them and RESNA. We are also working with the Federation of Credit Unions United to Service the Underserved, who have some history with AFPs in other states. The process continues. In addition, A2I has registered with the state to become a lender.

·  CETF project: CETF has changed what they expect from their grantees regularly, so we are looking for additional clarity. We do know that we can give $40 for every internet adoption to partners. Digital partnership agreements will be going out in next few weeks. CFILC is developing materials and website informations for partners.

·  DOnetwork: three Access Now summits are planned for February and March. There has been great success with the leadership academy happening via the web and in partnership with local centers. There has been a big victory with this and the AT Network – an accessible online voting form via the Secretary of State is about to launch. This is the only accessible one in the nation.

·  AT Network: see above. Additionally, some DLLs held open houses on Ed Roberts Day, which was very successful as an opportunity for outreach, additional loans, etc. DLLs are participating in on-site inventories, which CFILC and ILP staff have been and will be conducting. This way, we can get a better handle on what is owned by the center vs. owned by the state, as well as better tracking. There will be centralized purchasing and positioning of new devices, so that devices can be utilized at different locations and better used by consumers. New DLL brochures and AT pens will be available soon.

·  YO!: There are currently 9 volunteers place. We have the capacity for 15; 10 completed a year of service in 2013. There are 8 advisory members. YO! conducted 22 Disability History presentations in October as well as 3 Own My Power anti-bullying events since October. CID and DRC have put in requests for volunteers but have not heard back yet. Volunteers are going through interviews and working with staff members at centers.

Strategic Planning

What it is the future of IL if nothing changes?

·  Scattered, struggling organizations

·  Centers closing – fewer of us

·  Reduction in government funding – if we don’t continue to insist on being at the table, we will end up back with a medical model. Less independence for our community.

·  Contraction, rather than growth – only able to provide core services.

·  Becoming part of the medical model

·  Becoming irrelevant

·  Our services provided by others

·  Continuing to only serve a small percentage of the population, not serving people across all socio-economic statuses, who could need our services the most

·  Lost human connections and empowerment

What is the difference between what exists and what we want?

·  Speak with one voice

·  Change the names / universal branding – IL language has been co-opted by other organizations and industries (Disability Community Centers or Resources)

·  Be the trusted disability, community resource – be the place a community goes to find its identity, engages with the whole community

·  Strong trade association

·  Incorporate standardized history training for staff and community

·  Be open beyond 9-5 hours – build community

·  Draw on parallels with other communities

·  Youth focus – building an identity

·  Demonstrate outcomes from direct services

·  Awareness and integration with all communities / recruit allies

·  Volunteerism as a stepping stone to employment

·  Diversify funds / create business model

·  Advocacy, including in our work with other organizations (such as MCOs)

·  ACTION ITEM: Ana will take this information back to the strategic planning group to devise a statement and plan to bring back to the Board.

DOR

·  DOR expects to have the AB204 packet out by early-to-mid-June

·  The IL and AT unit is now fully staffed.

·  For the next round of 7B funding, priorities will be out in May and funding will be effective October, allowing for a full 12 months for ILCs to use within, if awarded funding.

·  DOR is looking, internally, at what is expected from ILCs in AB204 reporting. They hope to simplify and consolidate spreadsheets and narratives, making for more effective reporting.

·  RSA recruited Paul DeMange to help review and improve 704 reports; DOR is hoping that, through that process, they will get further information, but they will probably have to start on their own process before they receive anything.

·  DOR will significantly change the way CILR reports are done, first looking at what they are required to gather and what they want to get from it – they have just started this process. ILCs would like to be involved early in this process, as well as to help create the collection tool that shows our impact.This would help us with our strategic planning - what are we conveying and how are we showing impact? What do centers do that we do not get a chance to tell DOR about? How can we share that with them? An important note for DOR is to remember that a report that comes from statistics needs to wrap language around it to really describe and define what we do so legislators can understand our impact.

·  There was a sub-committee on data collection that would be happy to reconvene to help Jay with that. IL needs to take ownership of itself and ask for a taskforce on reports, or whatever it is that we need.

·  SPIL priority grants: there were a lot of applicants and a small pool of money. The pool will be bigger next year and they will be able to fund more organizations.

·  Assistive Technology has a new staff member – Sheila. The next AT Advisory Committee meeting takes place right before CSUN in San Diego.

·  AT Loan Guarantee Funds: DOR is looking at how to develop a loan product rather than an RFP process – a product that any bank could offer to their customers. DOR would like to have something in place by October 1st. Megan has prioritized this project for the year. Now that the division is fully staffed, they are meeting with CFILC monthly to work through the process. They are reaching out to experts in the lending industry to help figure out how to make it work.

·  ADRCs: some applicants have been approved for designation pending further information. The next submissions will be in April.

·  TBI: DOR is trying to develop additional funding to enhance and fully fund the program. There was a reduction in funding this year, so they have some additional funding – DOR needs to be approved for the additional spending authority – for the following year. They will be still funding up to 7 sites, as a grant rather than contract, which allows them to tailor what they do. They require sites to be Medi-Cal certified or have a plan in place to be certified by a certain date after sites are awarded.

·  A healthcare guidance letter was just released and is on the CFILC website.

·  DOR is looking at releasing further letters and offering technical assistance, along with a forum to gather questions, on contracting, cost-allocating, program income, etc. Paula McElwee is the resource to offer further TA on these topics.

SILC

·  The spending bill is a compromise bill – it is supposed to restore funds to domestic programs that were cut or taken by sequestration. ILCs received an increase of 3.34%. The increase in 7B funds will come immediately; the increase on 7C funds will not come until October 1st. A SPIL amendment must be filed for 7C funds to filter to the centers. SILC will be working on that.